Foreigner

“Live, on tape,” he said. He saw no reason to forbear anything, and he stayed angry, now, though on the edge of terror. He’d not deserved this, he told himself—not deserved it of Tabini, or Cenedi, or Ilisidi. “So who are you? What do you want, nadi? Anything reasonable? I’m sure not.”

“No fear at all?” the shadow asked him. “No remorse, no regret?”

“What should I regret, nadi? Relying on the dowager’s hospitality? If I’ve passed my welcome here, I apologize, and I’d like to—leave—”

One shadow separated itself from the others, picked up the chair, turned it quietly face about and sat down, arms folded on the low back.

“Where did you get the gun?” this shadow asked, a stranger’s voice,

“I didn’t have a gun. Banichi fired. I didn’t.”

“Why would Banichi involve himself? And why did it turn up in your bed?”

“I’ve no idea.”

“Has Banichi ever gone with you to Mospheira?”

“No.”

“Gone to Mospheira at all?”

“No. No ateva has, in my lifetime.”

“You’re lying about the gun, aren’t you?”

“No,” he said.

The tic in his left leg started again. He tried to stay calm and to think, while the questions came one after the other and periodically circled back to the business of the gun.

The tape ran out, and he watched them replace it. The tic never let up. Another one threatened, in his right arm, and he tried to change position to relieve it.

“What do you project,” the next question was, on a new tape, “on future raw metals shipments to Mospheira? Why the increase?”

“Because Mospheira’s infrastructure is wearing out.” It was the pat answer, the simplistic answer. “We need the raw metals. We have our own processing requirements.”

“And your own launch site?”

Wasn’t the same question. His heart skipped a beat. He knew he took too long. “What launch site?”

“We know. Yougave us satellites. Shouldn’t we know?”

“Don’t launch from Mospheira latitude. Can’t. Not practical.”

“Possible. Practical, if that’s the site you have. Or do any boats leave Mospheira that don’t have to do with fishing?”

What damned boats? he asked himself. If there was anything, hedidn’t know it, and he didn’t rule that out. “We’re not building any launch site, nadi, I swear to you. If we are, the paidhi isn’t aware of it.”

“You slip numbers into the dataflow. You encourage sectarian debates to delay us. Most clearly you’re stockpiling metals. You increase your demands for steel, for gold—you give us industries, and you trade us micro-circuits for graphite, for titanium, aluminum, palladium, elements we didn’t know existed a hundred years ago and, thanks to you, now we have a use for. Now you import them, minerals that don’t exist on Mospheira. For what? For what do you use these things, if not the same things you’ve taught us to use them for, for light-lift aircraft you don’t fly, for—”

“I’m not an engineer. I’m not expert in our manufacturing. I know we use these things in electronics, in high-strength steel for industry—”

“And light-lift aircraft? High-velocity fan blades for jets you don’t manufacture?”

He shook his head, childhood habit. It meant nothing to atevi. He was in dire trouble, and he couldn’t tell anybody who urgently needed to know the kind of suspicions atevi were entertaining. He feared he wouldn’t have the chance to tell anybody outside this room if he didn’t come up with plausible, cooperative answers for this man.

“I’ve no doubt—no doubt there are experimental aircraft. We haven’t anything but diagrams of what used to exist. We build test vehicles. Models. We testwhat we think we understand before we give advice that will let some ateva blow himself to bits, nadi, we know the dangers of these propellants and these flight systems—”

“Concern for us.”

“Nadi, I assure you, we don’t want some ateva blowing up a laboratory or falling out of the sky and everybody saying it was our fault. People find fault with the programs. There are enough people blaming us for planes that don’t file flight plans and city streets piled full of grain because the agriculture minister thought the computer was making up the numbers—damned right we have test programs. We try to prevent disasters before we ask you to risk your necks—it’s not a conspiracy, it’s public relations!”

“It’s more than tests,” the interrogator said. “The aiji is well aware. Is he not?”

“He’s not aware. I’m not aware. There isno launch site. There’s nothing we’re holding back, there’s nothing we’re hiding. If they’re building planes, it’s a test program.”

“Who gave you the gun, nadi?”

“Nobody gave me a gun. I didn’t even know it was under my mattress. Ask Cenedi how it got there.”

“Who gave it to you, nadi-ji? Just give us an answer. Say, The aiji gave it to me, and you can go back to bed and not be concerned in this.”

“I don’t know. I said I don’t know.”

The man nearest drew a gun. He saw the sheen on the barrel in the almost dark. The man moved closer and he felt the cold metal against his face. Well, he thought, That’s what we want, isn’t it? No more questions.